Imoke
From: Diana Okon-Effiong, Calabar
No fewer than 10,000 teachers in cross River schools system are now computer literate according to the State Commissioner for Education Prof. Offiong E.Offiong.
Offiong stated this in an interview with our correspondent at the NYSC Secondary School, Ikot Ansa, while giving a scorecard of Gov. Liyel Imoke’s administration in the education sector from 2007 to date
He said: “All our teachers are supposed to be computer literate if we are truly training our children for the digital age.
“I can tell you that over 10,000 of our teachers have benefited from this and not less than 75 per cent are becoming computer literate as we are talking now.There are ongoing training programme across the state right now.
“After that we should sufficiently trained about 60 per cent of our teachers, both primary and secondary in the school system, on use of computer.
He said that the state government “is concluding the due process for the commencement of comprehensive renovation of 40 additional schools’’.
“The Special Adviser, Due Process is on top of procurement and if the funding is there it is something we can accomplish under nine months,’’ Offiong said.
The commissioner said that the state government’s re-accreditation of schools was meant to phase out those that are substandard in public and private schools.
Offiong said: “A number of them have been closed that. We inherited over 700 private schools but we have been able to prune them down to about 600 now. We are commencing the process of re-accreditation again.
He said that the component of Cross River standards in public and private schools include the classrooms, the laboratories, the library, the assembly halls and recreation facilities.
He also said that since its intervention enrollment figures had gone up in the NYSC Secondary School.
“When we started the intervention the population of this school was about 500 but between 2007 and now the population has increased to more than 1,400.
“We anticipate that it will not come down so what we need to do is to be proactive and continue to provide them with adequate classrooms
“Every schools subscribe to maintenance levy so that all the little, little breakdown and damages are addressed before they culminate into major breakdown in school property. We have also embarked on teachers’ computer acquisition programme.
“At least two teachers in all our public schools are computer literate. But all teachers, through this acquisition programme, are expected to be computer literate.
“As regards the important component which has to do with recreation in NYSC school we have the challenge of space which is also a challenge for schools in the urban. But this school also harbours the NYSC state office in Cross River.
“Every school must have nearby football field and other facilities for recreation. A nearby estate secondary school provides full complement of this.
“The essence is that where there is need for competition that field will serve a cluster of our schools because it becomes very difficult for us to secure football fields and other games facilities for each of our schools.
“We also ensure that teachers are in a position to know what the students are doing. We also have standards for not less than 300 primary schools across the state are adequate classrooms, resource room or library, home economics laboratory,’’ he said.
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